1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a glass antenna jack of a vehicle, more particularly, to a glass antenna jack equipped with a locking structure between a connector and a terminal of the jack, which allows the connector and the terminal to be readily and firmly engaged.
2. Background
A vehicle is generally provided with an antenna for receiving signals from a broadcasting station such as AM/FM radio, TV and the like. In terms of a position to be installed and the appearance thereof, antennas can be categorized into pole antennas and glass antennas. Pole antennas are typically in shape of rod and projected from a body of a vehicle in an upright position. By contrast, as shown in FIG. 8, glass antennas are typically mounted or printed on a rear glass and/or a window glass.
Conventionally, while pole antennas have been widely used as antennas for transmitting and receiving radio waves of car telephones and portable telephones and receiving television broadcast waves, since the construction of these pole antennas requires them to protrude from the vehicle body, there have been caused drawbacks that the protrusion of the antennas is not preferable from safety and aesthetic appearance aspects and that the protruding antenna constitutes a disturbance and may be broken when washing a vehicle.
Due to this, in recent years, there have been demands for antennas with no protrusion such as glass antennas in which an antenna pattern is directly printed on a window glass of a vehicle and antennas in which a seal or sheet on which an antenna pattern is printed is affixed to a window glass of a vehicle, and those antennas have now been put to practical use.
In a conventional glass antenna system, the glass antenna is combined with a defogging or defrosting wire within a rear glass of a vehicle. Such a glass antenna system is necessarily provided with a device for coupling a printed antenna pattern, which is formed of thin conductive material like copper foil, to an electric cable via which received radio signals are transferred to a radio system of the vehicle. The device is a so-called glass antenna jack.
A glass antenna jack is typically furnished with a terminal coupled to a contact point of the antenna pattern, and a connector coupled to the electric cable.
Referring to FIGS. 6 and 7, a conventional glass antenna jack is briefly described. The conventional glass antenna jack includes a jack connector 10 and a jack terminal 26, coupling between which is achieved by inserting a couple of inwardly concave plates 48 into contact point portions 50 of slit type. Specifically, the connection between the concave plates 48 and the contact point portions 50 can be readily rendered by inserting the concave plates 48 into openings of the jack terminal 26, and subsequently rotating the jack connector 10 with respect to the jack terminal 26 so that the concave plates 48 forcibly fits into the slits of the contact point portions 50.
However, in the coupling between the conventional connector and the terminal, if an inserting force applied to the connector is excessive, the concave plates of the connector can be damaged, even though the concave plates are normally coupled to the contact point portions of the terminal. Moreover, the concave plates of the connector can be easily separated from the contact point portions of the terminal.
Numerous structures of glass antenna jack have been proposed for use with vehicles. For example, Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2001-313513 published on Nov. 09, 2001 discloses a terminal device for a glass antenna, in which buried portions of metal legs are electrically connected to two input terminals of a four terminal circuit on a circuit board, and a connector supporting portion is provided at an upper side of a buried portion of a resin-molded main body, and electrodes of the connector are respectively connected to two output terminals of the four terminal circuit.
Further, Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 1997-293550 published on Nov. 11, 1997 discloses a tap terminal comprising a base for installing a conductive metal plate which is securely connected to an antenna conductor or a heat coil formed at a window of a car, a terminal piece which is detachably connected to a connector of a lead wire connected to a power source, and a condenser which is detachably interposed between the base and the terminal piece, wherein the condenser is covered along with a part of the base and the terminal piece by a housing.
Furthermore, Korean Patent Laid-open No. 1999-021716 published on Mar. 25, 1999 discloses a terminal connecting device of a rear window glass antenna, comprising an antenna terminal which is protruded to an inner surface of a rear window glass so as to be electrically connected to the rear window glass antenna, a head lining which has a coupling hole formed at a rear place thereof so as to be placed in a position opposite to the antenna terminal and which is disposed at a lower side of a roof panel, and a connector assembly which is connected through the coupling hole of the head lining to the antenna terminal and also connected to a wiring at an inside of the head lining.
Furthermore, Korean Patent Laid-open No. 1998-076620 published on Nov. 16, 1998 discloses a terminal for a window glass antenna of vehicle, comprising a terminal housing which is formed with a plurality of terminal inserting holes respectively spaced at regular intervals and which has terminals respectively inserted into the terminal inserting holes, and a connector which has connecting terminals corresponding to the number of terminals installed in the terminal housing.
Nonetheless, the foregoing glass antenna jacks are disadvantageous in that coupling the connector and the terminal is labor-intensive work in the light of the structure thereof, which leads to decrease of the productivity. Therefore, there is a need for a glass antenna jack having an improved structure capable of securely and readily coupling the connector and the terminal.
The information disclosed in this Background of the Invention section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art that is already known to a person skilled in the art.